When I had a preschool in my home, I loved to play simple games with the kids to help them remember their letter sounds. No one ever wanted to stop playing, but I learned quickly that if you stop before they want to, it will be an even bigger hit when you play it again.

3 Easy Learn to Read Puzzle Activities

Sometimes parents try to over complicate activities to try and make them seem more exciting, but the best games are tried and true. That’s why the next 3 learn to read activities might seem simple to you, boring even, but for children, they are SO fun, especially because they are playing with you!

1.H&S – It’s a classic activity!

I know you are thinking that this MUST be good, because I’ve never heard it before. However, I had to trick you a little because you probably wouldn’t have read what I had to say if I made the title, Hide and Seek. Would you have?

This game is classic, but the most important thing parents miss out on is that children LOVE to hide almost more than they like to SEEK! So dump the letters out of the puzzle and have your child hide them around the room. “Not too hard now,” you can say!

Once you find a few, tell your child the sound of the letters and put them back in the puzzle to see which ones you have left to find.

You can ask your child for help finding and sounding out the letters. You might even get one wrong a couple times that you know your child knows so that they can correct you. Remember to tell them how smart they are when they do!

Get some FREE learn to read flashcards! Click here!

2. Letter Art – SO easy!

No tricks here! Get out the markers, crayons or colored pencils and have some fun tracing around the letter puzzle pieces. Remember to have them repeat the sound the letter that they are tracing around makes.

To help them learn to read even more, you can create words with some of the letters and help your child sound them out. Maybe create a word and then draw a picture below the nice big puzzle letter tracings.

3. Letter Relay – For Active Kids!

This learn to read activity has so many applications but here’s the short version. Take the letters that you are wanting your child to learn the sounds for out of the puzzle. Put them across the room. Have your child run, or hop, or roll, spin, skip, or crawl to one of the letter sounds you call out and bring it back to you. 

You can make this more interesting or challenging to your child by setting a timer to see how many they can get in a certain amount of time. You could make a little obstacle course by putting things for them to jump over or crawl under. 

Don’t forget to join in and take a turn! Your child might need a break! I know you are creative and can find other ways to make a relay really fun!

Learn to read activities don’t have to be complicated to be fun and effective! In fact, the more s

imple the better. We aren’t teaching our children how to play an elaborate game, they are learning to read! Make sure your learn to read activities are emphasizing the letter sounds, not the tasks needed to participate.

Comment below to tell me if you think of any other learn to read activities to do using a letter puzzle!

Check out these other Learn to Read Activities and Tips!

The post 3 Easy Learn to Read Puzzle Activities! first appeared on True Aim.

Story baskets are an excellent tool for toddlers and preschoolers, but they can also be helpful for older children — practicing speech, storytelling skills, imaginative play, developing early literacy skills, and more. They can be as simple or as complex as you like and don’t have to cost anything to put together. Just use found objects from around your home and books you already own or can check out from the library to fill it. Simple, inexpensive, and a great way to encourage fun reading time!

What to Include in Story Baskets

When I fill up a story basket, I begin with the basket itself and the book I want to highlight. Next, I flip through the book and look for key characters or objects that help tell the story.

For example, in The Very Hungry Caterpillar it would be a caterpillar, a leaf, a lollipop, cheese, watermelon, and a few other similar items. Then, I gather as many of the items as I can find. I can usually do this by going through our toy and craft supplies to find play food, puppets, figurines, etc. These items go into the basket with the book. If I can’t find a key item, I will cut something out of foam or maybe use a picture from a magazine.

If my child is working on a particular skill such as beginning letter sounds or sight words, I will include relevant letters in the basket as manipulatives as well.

How might you use a story basket?

This depends on the age of your children. When I first began making story baskets, we started with one book and focused on the items to go with that. As my daughters got older, it became more of a themed basket with several books and hands-on items.

How to Use Story Baskets

Here are some activities that we’ve done:

Include a favorite book (one they already know) with a few props that go along with the story for your child to tell in their own words. Or they could follow along with the props as you read aloud.

You can put in random items and have your child make up a story using some or all of the items in their story.

Have your child pick out an object at random and tell or write something about it.

Leave the basket out for your child to discover. Change it out when it no longer seems to hold their attention.

Bring a story basket along on car trips, while running errands, waiting at the doctor’s office, and waiting in restaurants.

Allow your child to choose the book/items and YOU continue the story.

Some of our favorite preschool to early elementary books that lend themselves well to story baskets are:

• If You give a Pig a Pancake
• Goodnight Moon
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar
• The Gruffalo
• Fairy Tales
• Bible Stories

I’ve been doing this for years with my daughters and they are always a hit. We take a delight-directed approach in our homeschool, so I build story baskets and unit studies based on their interests. It’s like a treasure chest of learning centered around great books!

Have you used story baskets? Let us know in the comments!

Sara is a homeschooling mom of three girls. She writes at Heart and Soul Homeschooling, sharing ideas for learning that encourage creativity, curiosity, character, and connection. She is an author, speaker, and homeschool consultant. You can find her on Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, and her Amazon author page.

Check out more Summer Reading Ideas!

The post Use Story Baskets to Make Reading Come to Life! first appeared on True Aim.

One summer, it only required reading ONE book the entire summer. The kids ran out of motivation in the first week.

Then, they introduced a ticket system to earn rewards. That seemed fair, except it was based on the number of books read each week. The children had to read at least three books a week to even enter the raffle for the prizes. There were no parameters on length of books.

How to Host a Family Summer Reading Club!

My children quickly got frustrated when they were ready long novels and their peers were racking in the tickets reading short comic books. That is when we decided to host our own family reading club and ditch the dollar store prizes for real motivation and excitement.

Set the Date

Decide when everyone will begin and finish reading. Your reading club can last a week or the entire summer. Setting a schedule, gives everyone an opportunity to plan out their reading. Pick a reasonable amount of time. A few weeks is ideal.

If the club goes too long, it loses momentum. If it is too short, there’s not enough time to really get sucked into the world of reading.

Decide on a time frame that fits your schedule. We’ve done anything from ten days to six weeks! A mini reading club is a great for the winter months, when you just need a break from school! It’s also an option for when life gets busy with a new baby or move. The learning keeps going even when you can’t teach.

Family Summer Reading Club: Create a Point System

Next, you need to decide how readers will earn rewards. Since we have a large age span, we had to level the playing field a bit. Counting books didn’t work. We give points based on one short book or 20 pages of a longer book. This motivates the older children to delve into great literature without feeling like they have short changed themselves, as their younger siblings zoom ahead.

Here is our point plan:
2 points for a book or 20 pages read independently
2 points for a book read to a younger sibling
3 points for a complete audiobook
1 point for each chapter of family read-alouds

Family Summer Reading Club: Prizes, Prizes, Prizes

Now, here’s what the kids really want to know! What are the prizes? You don’t need expensive prizes. A family favorite reward, in our home, is a living room camp out. We set up air mattresses in the living room, read stories by flashlight, and watch a movie. It cost nothing, but it is always the most requested! So, living room camp outs cost 45 points!

Here are some other ideas:

• Treat from the dollar store
• Watch an extra show
• Dinner at the beach
• Play date
• Family hike
• Pick what’s for dinner
• Afternoon hike
• Family movie night, including popcorn
• Two days off of handwriting practice
• New book or audiobook
• Campfire dinner
• Day off of chores
• Afternoon at the park
• Make your own pizza party
• Ice cream cone
• $5 gift card to the dollar store
• Eat whatever you want for breakfast–yes, cookies count!

As you can see, most of these are very inexpensive. Most of them are free! The children are working more for experiences than plastic prizes. So this books club is cost effective and doesn’t create clutter. Both are big wins for homeschooling families.

Add it All Up

On the last day, collect the tally sheets. Give each participant their grand total and see who earned the most points. Celebrate finishing the book club. Pick something simple! The best part is spending the time together and celebrating in your accomplishments.

Set a time frame for redemption of prizes. This may seem unnecessary, but it prevents mom or dad from losing track of which prizes have been awarded. Nothing is worse than a child claiming a year later that he never got his prize, and you can’t remember if he did or not. This will keep up the excitement but also help transition back to everyday life.

How are you motivating your family reading this summer?

Jennifer Elia, homeschool consultant, mentor, blogger, and Amazon best selling author, is Founder of Sound Foundations Homeschool which is dedicated to giving homeschool moms the tools they need to thrive in their home education career. Jennifer provides one-on-one consulting, personalized and original curriculum plans, and practical advice for those just beginning their homeschool journey, as well as those who just need a little boost. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and four children whom she has been educating at home for the past 10 years. You can find Jennifer on Facebook and Pinterest.

Check out more Summer Reading Ideas Here!

The post How to Host a Family Summer Reading Club! first appeared on True Aim.

I’ve never met a musician who didn’t start out with one simple chord…and I’ve never met a bibliophile who didn’t read as a kid. Practice is so important to everything we do in life – but struggling readers – especially beyond elementary school – probably don’t have a lot of experience with reading. Historically, it’s been a challenge for them, and so it’s become something they are good at circumventing.

Showing these students the Hi-Lo road will help to foster a love of reading and teach those skills that are necessary for even the most basic of careers. It provides students with a sense of empowerment and confidence as they tackle the challenge of becoming a better reader!

What’s Missing Here?

The post The Hi-Lo Road to Reading Fluency first appeared on True Aim.

One of the best things you can do for your children in the New Year is READ to them more! That’s right! Here are just a few of the benefits, but you can read more about what reading does here.

Why Raise a Reader?

• Reduces stress!
• Increases vocabulary
• Strengthens Parent-child relationships
• Increases comprehension
• Increases empathy
• Boosts writing skills
• Prevents delinquency

Reading is priceless! How do you know you are doing enough? The suggested amount is 20 minutes each day. If you are doing that, you are doing an AMAZING job! To see exactly how you are doing compared to the suggestion, you can take the Reading Quiz here on Facebook.

However, it’s not fun if you don’t have a good selection of books to read. Sure, kids don’t care if you read their favorite book over and over, but it’s important that you enjoy what you’re reading too!

Good news! There’s an easy way to get award winning, age appropriate books without any extra time! Try Usborne Books and More’s new Book Box Subscriptions!

This takes the effort of shopping or going to the library and helps you build up your bookshelf with books your kids love and you don’t mind reading! Plus, you’ll get HUGE value!

Here’s what you’ll get:

• 4 age appropriate books
• 3 month subscription (Jan, Feb, March)
• Bonus gift each month
• Only new titles!
• Over $130 value!
• Entered to win exclusive giveaway!

These also make great gifts! You can even send each box to a different address if you’d like! Don’t miss your chance to join!

HURRY! Sign ups end on 12/31/18! Sign up today!

The post Raise a Reader in the New Year! first appeared on True Aim.